Following Ice Cube's hectic attention grabbing past few days, the rapper/actor and now sports mogul must turn his focus to ready for the launch of his ambitious newly created professional basketball league, BIG3. This past Friday, June 9th, the former N.W.A talent and solo rap star published his powerful provocative, anti-police brutality video "Good Cop Bad Cop" which marks a return to form for the once revolutionary rap artist and is one of three bonus tracks off the new 25th Anniversary Edition of Death Certificate, his second post N.W.A solo album originally released in December 1991. [released in May 1990, AmeriKKKa's Most Wantedwas Cube's debut solo). In the two days since the YouTube music video posting of the song, which revisits many of the themes addressed three decades ago in N.W.A classic that Cube co-wrote with MC Renand Eazy-E, "Fuck The Police," the captivating new clip has gone viral garnering over 2.75 million views by Sunday night.

Looking like an almost N.W.A reunion (sans Dr. Dre and the late Eazy-E), Ice Cube "featuring" MC Ren and DJ Yella at this October's Treasure Island Music Festival has been generating a buzz among hip-hop fans in the Bay Area since the lineup announcement yesterday. The tenth and final San Francisco Bay island located music festival on October 16 & 17, the festival will feature co-headliner Sigur Rós. Many rap fans have taken to social media to project their thoughts/hopes for the Cube & co. set. Some have suggested that the anticipated performance by the star rapper-turned-actor along with his two former N.W.A rap crew mates could result in an N.W.A reunion of sorts. All it would take would be to arrange for Dr. Dre to fly into town to join his former Compton rap crew and arrange for that hologram of Eazy-E that was premiered at Rock The Bells three years ago. See video below of that 2013 performance by Bone Thugs-N-Harmony featuring the life like hologram of the late Eazy-E plus Yella onstage.

Yesterday the White House, via a published Spotify playlist, unveiled the playlist (left) chosen by the president and First Lady (The First Playlist?) for this 2015 Christmas/holiday season. Descriptively entitled Holidays with the Obamas, the virtual mixtape noticeably does not include any hip-hop by the man dubbed by many as the "first hip-hop president." Not even Run-D.M.C.'s ubiquitous holiday hit "Christmas In Hollis" (slightly devalued IMO by its use in a car commercial) that was first released in 1987 when the president was 26 and Michelle was 23 and they were both reportedly fans of hip-hop & rap. Also absent are such hip-hop friends and guests of the current White House as Common and Jay-Z. But then come think of it, neither recorded Christmas songs that I am aware of. However Hova's wife and fellow former White House performer Beyonce did make the current playlist, as part of the female trio that catapulted her to fame.

Black Fridayis coming up on Nov. 27, that big shopping day right after Thanksgiving. The folks at Record Store Daywill be releasing more than 140 releases that day, not to mention it’s new release day, with new stuff out from Bjork, Parquet Courtsand others. If you can't make it in to one of our stores on 11/27, there's still hope you can snag one of these titles. We'll be adding Record Store Day Black Friday releases to Amoeba.com throughout the day.

See a list (.pdf) of everything we’ll have for sale here, and check out our 12 picks for releases to look for on Black Friday below.

Tairrie B, who returns to rap following a two-decade detour into rock with a new rap album,has been called a pioneer for paving the way for the current generation white female rappers like Iggy Azalea, who was born the year that Tairrie B burst onto the national rap scene. That was 1990 when she was signed by Eazy-E who released her debut solo album The Power Of A Woman on his Ruthless Records imprint Comptown Records, which had major distribution through MCA. Her early 90's debut album's contributors included such heavy hitters as Eazy-E (of course), Schoolly D, Everlast, The D.O.C., and Dr. Dre, each of whom had small cameos. Originally, Eazy suggested a last track (traditionally a posse cut) called "I Ain't Yo Bitch" and having Ice Cube or The D.O.C. pen with Dre producing. How that would have gone down was that the guys in N.W.A would each have a verse calling the female artist a "bitch" with the song's target shooting back a closing retort. Reportedly, Tairrie B did not approve the song concept or the idea of Dr. Dre having the final word in the studio. That led to behind the scenes conflicts that, in turn, led to her writing her own last song that she titled "Ruthless Bitch." In the updated, self-empowering track, she took the word "bitch" and flipped the script by defining it as "B.I.T.C.H" meaning "Being In Total Control of Herself." Her goal was to replace the negative stigma associated with the word and turn the tables. Not surprisingly, not all were happy with her changes. One unhappy party was Dr. Dre, who she would run into at an after party for the Grammy's at which he reportedly physically assaulted her. She would go on to re-record the track changing the verse about Dre to include the line: "World class you got no class, So when they said let you produce me, I said I'll pass. As for the Grammy's, I'll put that on the shelf...It takes a punk motherfucker to play himself, Your best shot was weak, I didn't need stitches...Get this straight, I ain't one of your bitches! You cartoon gangsta, I'm calling your bluff...Hitting a woman, that makes you real tough!"